My Friend the 084
by sammie28
Summary: Every hour, every day, every week, every month, every year, SHIELD protects the world from scary, other-worldly invaders. This is not one of them. No matter what Ward believes. (Good!Ward AU, Crack!FF)


**My Friend the 084**  
by Sammie

DISCLAIMER: Apologizes to Hayao Miyazaki and _Tonari no Totoro_, whose big Totoro inspired the 084. The team, Thor, etc. belong to Marvel. Scenes from "Brooklyn 99" and "Thirteen Days". Name-dropped films, shows, etc. Quotes belong to their owners (Shakespeare, "Dirty Dancing," a fandom "Texts from Last Night," "4th String Jaegers"). GeoComTex and its owner are "Doctor Who" but the timeline has been altered. The last comment is from Sheila Paulson's brilliant "Star Wars" FF "Just a Little Inconvenience." (Ms. Paulson, I've tried and failed at finding you to ask permission to use it; in the unlikely event you see this, please contact me and I'll take it down if you so wish.)

RATING: K+

SUMMARY: Every hour, every day, every week, every month, every year, SHIELD protects the world from scary, other-worldly invaders. This is not one of them. No matter what Ward believes. (Good!Ward AU. Crack!fic.) **Leans Ward/Simmons - you are warned.**

A/N:  
- Thank you to everybody who read and reviewed! I'm sorry I can't respond to anonymous reviews, but thank you for taking the time to write. This time, a fun story. It was started before "Apolutrosis" but finished concurrently (something to take my mind off of the former).

- AU because Ward is not HYDRA. Yes, it's a welcome twist, but only because there's no character development for anybody but Coulson and Skye. I'm an evil fan (Hail Hydra!) when I say I've been bored with all the episodes _since_ "Cap2", given where the episodes focus. They're just not interesting. "How I Met Your Mother" has shown that things planned from the start aren't always good ideas; characters designed on paper when a show starts never take into account actors' chemistry - or lack of it!, acting strengths and weaknesses, growth of actors over a season or more.

* * *

This was NOT funny.

Glaring at the monitor, Ward stared down prisoner, who was locked in their interrogation room with the metal alloy, polygon-al walls. This was a dangerous, self-serving criminal, one of the worst SHIELD had ever seen in its ability to manipulate the emotions. Raina had nothing on this guy.

As if on cue, the prisoner amp-ed up what he was doing.

But Ward held firm. He had learned his lesson with Lorelei. He hardened his heart and his will - not that it was that difficult, given the prisoner they were holding - and stared right back at the screen.

Skye came into the lab, took one look at the monitor, and then promptly glared at _Ward_ and yelled at the top of her lungs, "STOP! IT'S LIKE THE POOR BABY CAN SEE YOU RIGHT THROUGH THE SCREEN!"

This only made Ward glare all the more intently at the monitor.

And the 084 cried harder.

* * *

It started with the call from SHIELD headquarters to head into the eastern highlands of Africa, into the Nyanga mountains, to investigate what a visiting scientist had described as an odd form of wildlife he had been unable to catalogue.

Oh, it looked all cute. It looked like a cross between a fat baby penguin and the Nintendo video game character Kirby. (Skye said he looked a little like Totoro, just a baby version, which got cheers of approval from FitzSimmons, whatever dangerous #$*& Totoro was.) It had short, soft-looking fur, colored in pale, pale pastel swirls of purple and blue. Its face was like a Labrador puppy's, with a small nose and big brown eyes. It also had bigger, pointy ears which were right now drooping a little.

It moved by bouncing, but more like a bubble or a balloon than a basketball: it would hop, but it had the ability to stay suspended in the air for a little bit before floating back down. It was also quite quick and powerful on the jump, too. It was a weird picture when it hopped and cried (cried neon pink tears!) at the same time, and that's what happened for a good twenty minutes as they closed in on the thing, trying to capture it. He and May had started in towards the thing first, only for it to hop past them towards Coulson and Fitz. It was like trying to herd chickens, and Skye had been no help, sometimes laughing her head off at her teammates (while taping the whole thing on her phone), sometimes sympathizing with the 084 and twice even helping it escape when they got near enough to capture it. (It continued even after Coulson yelled at her, but one glare from May stopped all that.)

That's when the real trouble started. Once captured, the thing sat huddled in the bottom of the cage and continued to cry all the way back to the short bus. Then the thing cried the entire drive back to the regular bus.

When they pulled the ventilated Plexiglass cage out of the back of the short bus, Simmons - who had been left back at the bus because she was still getting over a cold - took one look at the 084 and promptly said, "Oh, look at the poor dear!" which meant, basically, that she was already a lost cause. It didn't help that Fitz described the thing as having the ears of a Corgi. (And that's how Ward found out what Simmons's favorite breed of dog was.)

Coulson had to intervene, ordering the younger agents to stay hands off until the biochemist had had a chance to test a snippet of its fur, its tears, its droppings, and its poop - whatever they could get their hands on without hurting the thing or themselves.

And because the younger agents just wanted to pet the 084 (he worked with children, Ward groused - CHILDREN!), the specialist got tasked with collecting the samples. It was no easy task, either, wearing thick neon green plastic gloves which went up to his shoulders and trying to reach into the cage to catch the little bastard, who was hopping around its cage to get away from him, sobbing all the while. And who got sympathy? Not Ward, at whom the others laughed at his futile attempts to catch the thing long enough to get some fur; they all "aww"ed when the 084 misjudged a hop and hit its head on the top of the cage and burst into more tears, sitting in the corner of its cage with its wing-arm-flipper things on top of its bumped head.

Even as he was checking the small razor to see if it worked, Skye was looking at him with a look of horrified disgust: "Ward, it's a razor. You look like Leatherface holding a chainsaw!"

Complete exaggeration. Complete exaggeration.

It took Simmons, singing different lullabies, to calm the 084 enough for it to stop moving so he could get a fur sample. The Englishwoman was by no means an opera singer, but her simple, clear, and unadorned voice was really a pleasant surprise to Ward. And of course she could sing Solveig's lullaby and the _berceuse_ from _Jocelyn_ with a perfect accent. Completely mesmerizing. Dang, how lucky would her kids -

He quickly snapped out of it when he saw Fitz and Skye looking at him oddly. Thankfully, Simmons was completely oblivious, because her attention was focused on the pair of big brown eyes gazing adoringly at her. And he meant the 084's, of course. Really.

Finally, when the whole ordeal was over (and for some reason, everybody thought it was just an ordeal for the 084 and not for him), they released it into the interrogation room so it could move around. Was it grateful? Of course not. The cameras captured it doing exactly what it had been doing the entire time before: crying. One thing was for sure - that...thing...had tear ducts bigger than Niagara Falls. And it was certainly manipulative: what the younger three agents called "crying" sounded more like a mix between hiccups and irrtating mewling. Skye and FitzSimmons, however, described it as sounding like a baby crying mixed with a puppy's sniffles.

Their determination to see this 084 as cute and adorable was clouding their judgment, Ward told them.

Skye had responded with, "Ward, we're going to play a game called 'Chill the F- Out.' You're our first contestant."

It was impossible to protect people who wanted to be idiots, Ward had complained to himself.

* * *

"The poor baby's still crying," Skye sympathized, looking at the screen. "It's been three hours since we brought him on board!"

"Crocodile tears," Ward groused.

"Fitz, can't we do something?"

"I am doing something. Just hang on." A few minutes later, the camera picked up the sound: a recording of Jemma singing the lullaby from _Madame Butterfly_, piped into the interrogation room. After a couple minutes, the 084's sobs turned into little sniffles, and it sat quietly in the corner, listening.

"Those are weird-colored tears," Fitz replied doubtfully, coming from his jerry-rigged baby-soothing endeavor and looking at the growing puddle of hot-pink colored, translucent stuff on the floor around the 084. "And they're coming from a thing that looks like a teddy bear."

"We don't know what's actually coming out its eye sockets, and we don't what it means," Ward argued, a little irritated that they refused to fall in line with his reasoning. "Those tears could be poison. Could be highly toxic to the us humans, could be highly toxic to the earth. It might stain everything, like even your skin and hair. It might be toxic to breathe in, causing you to cough up pink vapors."

It was a solid argument, and he saw all three of the younger agents fall silent. He couldn't help but feel a little proud of himself, that he had finally made them see the light.

Until Fitz held up a finger and said suspiciously, "Did you just compare those hot pink tears to kaiju blue?"

There was a beat, a moment of silence as the stone-faced agent's mind scrambled frantically to locate where he'd come up with that description.

D-mn.

Keep still, keep still, keep still. He could bluff his way out of this.

The muscle under his eye jumped.

"I TOLD you he loves it as much as we do!" Skye crowed in triumph, she and Fitz slapping high fives and down-lows (much to Ward's chagrined irritation). Stupid, stupid, stupid. Ward knew he'd heard that descriptions somewhere and just couldn't place it.

It had been a mere five weeks since Skye found out that Fitz was a big fan of "Pacific Rim," and ever since, Ward's life had become a living hell that made kaiju invasions look like visits with baby bunnies. They'd been discussing all iterations of the film non-stop: film, extras, books, online games. The kicker had been when Skye hacked their Wii Dance Dance Revolution set so that Fitz could enter personally-made hologram images of the movie's big robots to replace the human dancers. They'd then renamed the game "Moves like Jaeger" and played it constantly. Ward couldn't even hear Maroon 5 any more without the sudden urge to go into a fetal position and rock himself back and forth to ease the pain.

Skye had even told Coulson that if she played more DDR (Ward refused to call it that stupid rennamed version), she should have to do less aerobic exercise physical training with "Mr. Jillian Michaels" over there (as she pointed to Ward). When Ward protested, Coulson shrugged and pointed out that it was either this or allow the younger agents to continue playing the dancing minigame from Kinect Star Wars, and Ward had to concede. Watching Han Solo and Boba Fett dancing had been bloodily shredding to pieces his childhood memories and making him wish he'd be frozen in carbonite. Watching dancing robots (which he was sure would make the movie producers cry) was less emotionally compromising. Not any less irritating, but less damaging.

He had expected May and Simmons to side with him, but no. May liked the older ginger Australian pilot with the scruff and dreamy long eyelashes and clear blue eyes and rough voice - and she described him just like that, even as he and Coulson stared at her with half-shocked, half-offended grimaces on their faces. Simmons was besotted with the blond sweater-wearer with the bad American accent, sighing unconsciously whenever the punk took his shirt off, which was far too often, according to Ward. (Skye said it only happened twice, but Ward was sure it was far more than that.)

That latter really irked Ward. What did a man have to do to get attention around here? His American accent was perfect (and native!), but whenever he took his shirt off Simmons just groused about him tearing his stitches or promptly attached medical nodes to his body with all the enthusiasm of a homeowner sticking magnets to a refrigerator. Was it because he wasn't blond and blue-eyed? Would he look good as a blond? Not that he was jealous of a fictional American character. Of course not. (But all this did not inspire him with confidence when the team met with Steve Rogers in two months.)

"So, Simmons," Skye said, her face still split in a wide smile, "does our 084's tears potentially stain our skin and hair and poison us?"

Just as if on cue, Simmons' machine dinged and began to spit out a reading. After a few moments, Simmons started rattling off some of the chemicals coming up: "galactose, sucrose, vanillin..." she trailed off.

"Sounds like food," Fitz said, frowning.

She stared down at the list. "It's the chemical make-up of cake icing."

The other three agents stared at her before Skye suddenly squealed, "It cries icing?!"

"It's too watery," Ward argued, rapidly feeling his loss of control over the circumstances.

"High water content," Fitz mused, looking over Jemma's shoulder.

"If the 084 poops cake balls, I say we keep him forever," Skye announced. "Especially if they're red velvet cake balls. I love red velvet."

"That's disgusting," Ward exclaimed, then kicked himself mentally. He shouldn't be encouraging this.

"One man's trash is another man's treasure," Skye shrugged.

At that moment, the machine dinged, spitting out another long readout.

"Well?" Ward said, crossing his arms.

"Not quite cake balls," Simmons replied as she looked through the list.

"I'll take brownies or cookies or ice cream," Skye replied, completely undaunted.

"Skye, be realistic," Ward growled impatiently. "That thing's an 084."

There was a long silence as all three looked at the biochemist, who was studiously avoiding their gaze.

"Jemma?" Fitz asked.

"I'm right, aren't I?" Skye gloated smugly.

"Marzipan," Jemma intoned.

Ward groaned. This day could not get any worse: a pastel-colored 084 that cried icing and pooped marzipan? Skye was jumping up and down, hooting and cheering and dancing a victory dance around her SO. All his glaring did nothing to stop her enthusiasm, and he supposed it was well-founded. She'd had two right guesses about an 084 and got him to admit their crazy "Pacific Rim" fan antics had gotten to him.

He needed a drink. As he stalked out of the lab and upstairs, he heard Skye whisper to the two others, "What's marzipan?"

{ }

There still wasn't enough alcohol in the world, however, to make him forget the entire episode. His ability to hold his drink, normally a boon when being chased by bad guys, was now not doing him any favors. Even May had given him 'stop. Stop. STOP.' looks before giving up and going to the cockpit.

Then he saw it, from the corner of his eye, as he sat at the bar: little Jemma Simmons, barely five-foot-four, marching across the main floor of the bus with her thirty-six inches tall Paddington Bear, Skye and Fitz hot on her heels.

Why somebody would even want a three-foot tall bear in the tiny bunk anyhow - one could barely squeeze a human being into one of those boxes as it was - already baffled him. It was her choice of destination, however, which had him jumping off the barstool at a full run.

He grabbed her hand right off the doorknob to the interrogation room. "You are not walking in there with your Paddington Bear," he commanded in his best Level 7, Supervising Officer voice, the same tone that had made Level 4 trainees cry.

Nobody was crying. Perhaps because they were Level 5.

"Then I won't take the bear," Jemma replied brightly.

Ward just glared.

Skye leaned over to her and stage-whispered, "I don't believe it's the bear Ward objects to."

At that, Simmons threw up her hands. "The poor thing needs some comfort! I - "

"I can bring the bear in," Fitz offered.

"How does that fix this problem?" Ward snapped, his voice rising in pitch.

"Because it's not Jemma going in there?" Fitz suggested, and Skye giggled at Ward's face. "You wouldn't let me in there?" he asks incredulously.

"No!" Ward shouted incredulously, right at the engineer.

"I thought it was you not wanting _Jemma_ getting hurt," Fitz mumbled.

"NO! THE POINT IS NOT THE BEAR. THE POINT IS NOT _WHO_ GOES IN THERE. THE POINT IS THAT NOBODY IS WALKING IN THERE!" Ward hollered. He noted that he never had to yell at Level 4 trainees. Actually, he never even had to open his mouth. All he had to do was glare.

Clearly not working on the three here.

Skye suddenly perked up. "What about the DWARVEs? Why don't we use the DWARVEs?"

"That's a great idea!" Fitz exclaimed.

Ward could feel nausea coming on.

{ }

Skye stared at him with an incredulous look on her face. "You look ridiculous."

"I'm facing an 084."

"Who's barely three feet tall, is baby blue in coloring and has been crying non-stop."

"So I took an ICER."

"You also took a real gun!"

Ward shrugged. So he had. It had been a fight to get the three younger agents even to give him an ICER; they'd hidden all of them, but not very well. He'd managed to find the hidden ICERs in three minutes (that's why he's Level 7): they'd put them in their secret deep-fryer, which had a crate-sized box of Twinkies to go with it. (Deep-fried Twinkies would explain A LOT about the three of them.) He then took the emptied ICERs and picked up some fresh dendrotoxin rounds. Skye had been in a panic about using such heavy rounds on such a small body, and Fitz had told her that he and Jemma had reduced the dendrotoxin rounds to fit the 084, all on the misconceived notion that the thing wasn't dangerous. Problem was Fitz whispered a little too loudly - and was overheard by the specialist.

So Ward took a regular shotgun, much to the protest of the three younger agents who were now trailing him. Skye was talking (when wasn't she?), but it was the two Brits who were throwing him looks of hatred. Apparently the meme was "Keep Calm and Kill with Your Eyes."

"You. Briefing," Ward barked.

The two scientists went obediently to the main floor briefing table, even if Simmons could be heard muttering, "I'm not a dog" as they went.

Ward carefully put his hand on the door handle, then, on the count of three, swung it open. He leveled the shotgun right at the 084, who looked up for a moment in silent shock and then burst into bigger tears.

Skye rolls her eyes. "Seriously, Ward? Seriously? The shotgun?"

"We ready?" Fitz was radioing.

"In position and awaiting your orders," Skye replied in an exaggerated Russian accent.

Ward stopped to look at Skye in confusion. Clearly he was not in on something.

There was a light whirring, and Jemma's big 3-foot Paddington Bear came into view. It was suspended a good three feet off the floor. Under each arm was tough nylon string, which lifted the bear at its left and its right shoulders. Each loop of string was meticulously attached to a DWARVE, the two of whom flew in tandem - same height, same speed, same turns - towards the interrogation room.

Seriously, Ward didn't get it. They could have just thrown the bear into the room and slammed the door shut and saved all this time and energy, but nobody liked his practical suggestion.

(He also couldn't believe he, Level 7 field agent of SHIELD, had been arguing about throwing a teddy bear into a room and slamming the door shut. What was he, five?)

The two little dwarves flew carefully into the room, the bear suspended between them, strings under each arm. "LOCCENT, Bear-no Alpha reaching the target zone," Skye continued in that exaggerated accent that was making Russians everywhere cry. "Disengaging transport." The little DWARVEs let go, and the bear thudded to the ground directly in front of the 084 before zooming out. Ward quickly shut the door and joined the two other agents in the briefing room.

The little 084 cried some more, covering its head and shrinking from the bear sitting a few feet away. Getting no reaction, it hopped over to the bear, poking it with a flipper. When Paddington continued to smile cheerfully and did nothing else, the 084 snuggled into the bear's arms and then cried itself to sleep.

"Oh," Jemma sighed in sympathy, pressing her hands to her heart. "Look at the poor thing."

Ward sighed in exasperation.

* * *

"No, you can't touch him until we discover what he is."

"We're already tested all his tears, his snot, his poop, his fur," Skye argued. "What - "

"'We'?" Ward questioned with a raised eyebrow.

"OK, fine, SIMMONS has already tested all that," Skye corrected. "And he's fine!"

"_It_ stays in the interrogation room, and nobody touches _it_, until we know what _it_ is!"

He turned to stomp off, then noticed the biochemist standing there watching the monitor, big goggles sitting on top of her head, her labcoat on, the complete opposite reaction to his: her face contorted in sympathy and pain for the creature. "The poor thing's still frightened," she said, her voice full of pain and hurt.

"You're forbidden from touching him!" Ward ordered.

Fitz clicked his tongue disapprovingly, not looking up from what he was doing.

"'Forbidden'?" Her voice was sharp, and any kindness she had displayed towards her previous object of study was now gone. Jemma drew herself up her whole 5'4" height, turning slowly to face him. She stared intently up up up towards her coworker. "'For - BIDDEN'?"

"Uh oh," Fitz muttered, sighing.

Ward stopped. A tiny voice in his head was shouting warnings, but he ignored them. "Yes. You're FORBIDDEN."

Jemma glared at Ward, then, without breaking her angry stare right at him, burst in a fast run out of the lab.

"D-mn!" he shouted, then took off after her, just to run face-first into the closing glass lab door. He whirled around, infuriated.

"She's my best friend," Fitz said unapologetically, taking his hand off the lab door button.

Swearing, Ward pushed the door open and bound up the stairs, running two at a time while Skye shouted up the stairs unhelpfully, "Simmons! He's coming!" as she and Fitz ran after Ward.

He was gaining on her - his legs were much longer - but Jemma didn't even have to stop to unlock the interrogation room door - that HAD to have been Fitz's doing! - and left Ward standing there in the doorway with just her lab coat in his hands, the owner having easily slipped out of it and into the room.

"Hi, baby," she said in her soft, gentle tone, reaching out a hand to stroke his fur, gently scratching between his ears. The 084 seemed to recognize the voice, because it just burst into bigger tears and jumped straight at her, which just caused Ward to shout and to lunge for the night-night gun tucked in the back waistband of his pants. (Yes, he has thought about the consequences of the gun going off accidentally.) His shot only went wide because Skye, who had just arrived, slammed her fist into the bottom of it, pushing the gun up and sending the shot straight into the ceiling.

The little 084 continued to sob in Jemma's arms, wrapping its little arms around her neck and shoulders and clinging on for dear life, wiggling deeper into her embrace and burying its face in her hair.

"Oh, what the h-ll," Ward shouted, just to see everybody else standing around and smirking. "You're just going to let this happen?" he exclaimed, looking at May and Coulson, who just looked amused instead.

Jemma gently cuddled the distraught baby, talking soothingly as she walked towards the door. When she could meet Ward's eyes, she gave him that same glaring stare as she walked out the door, holding his gaze with her angry one until she'd exited.

"I believe she's mad at you," Skye snickered.

* * *

The whole thing was a down-spiral from there. Despite the fact that nobody knew what the thing was, they all treated it like the newest agent on board. Jemma just called it 'baby' all the time, and the thing responded pretty quickly to the affection in her voice. Soon Fitz and Skye were referring to it as such, too.

Too bad they couldn't put the baby in a corner.

Skye taught it how to do somersaults and roll across the carpet, then would tickle it and swing it back and forth with its arms. She'd also taught it to blow raspberries, which meant now that instead of hopping and crying it hopped and blew raspberries. (Ward did not believe this was an improvement.) Fitz got it to help him with experiments by jumping as he tested the thing's leg strength and weight against gravity. Once he discovered how much control the 084 had over its jumps and the time it was suspended in the air, the engineer then got it to help with hanging up decorations on the ceiling of the bus. Ward was still bitter about the cartoon of him hanging up on the ceiling of the cargo bay, where nobody but that 084, jumping from the mezzanine, could reach.

They even showed their pet to the 084. Coulson wouldn't let them have a puppy because it would bark, and Fury said the fish tank was too messy, and so they'd gotten a Netherland Dwarf rabbit ("cute and silent!" Skye pointed out). The 084 would pet and talk to it (more like chitter at it). Ward had warned them that the 084 might eat the rabbit, to which Skye and Fitz had stared at him in horror and in disbelief before the latter muttered, "Not so much brain as earwax."

One day when they were watching "Pacific Rim" yet again, the 084 clambered into Fitz's lap, and after that the whole thing was a lost cause because apparently robots punching lizards was right up the thing's alley: he'd chitter and grin so wide his eyes became little half-moons, and then he learned to imitate Skye's clapping and clap his two little flippers together. The first time he saw the Australian robot puff its chest out and huge guns popped out of its metal pecs to shoot the lizard, the little 084 was so excited he jumped up and down and, from there on out, and often imitate the robot by puffing its chest out, much to the delighted amusement of both film fans.

(Seriously, Ward thought. If he stuck out his chest like that they'd accuse him of peacocking. And give that kaiju some credit - it had some class, avoiding the Sydney Opera House on its way into the city.)

Coulson and May were no help. Ward came into the kitchen once to make a sandwich and saw Coulson at the refrigerator, the door open and him looking down at the floor, then pointing at something else in the refrigerator. The specialist was seriously concerned for his commanding officer's sanity (perhaps it was an after-effect of TAHITI) until he came around the side saw the little 084 standing there, looking up in the fridge. It pointed at something, and the _man actually gave it to him_. (Again, concerns about Coulson's sanity.) What was worse was that it was the last tomato in the fridge. How does one make sandwiches without tomatoes?

One of the other days, FitzSimmons and Skye were running some experiment which involved the two scientists down in the lab, shouting up the stairs of the bus (they do have comm devices, you know), and Skye operating something in the briefing room, also shouting. He was sure they were going to wake up the 084 at any time, and then that'd be a mess, so Ward dared to enter the cockpit - even risking the wrath of May - to escape the noise. He went in, saying, "I'm sorry - it's just crazy out there" and started to sit down in the co-pilot seat when he heard a baby squeak.

He looked down to see the 084 beam up at him. He was wearing a little aviation headset with headphone and microphone, just like May's.

Swearing, Ward left the cockpit.

{ }

In order to keep it "healthy," according to Skye, she and Fitz taught it how to play DDR ("It's now 'Moves Like Jaeger'! Get it right, Ward!" Skye shouted), and seriously, given the number of Shaun T hip-hop-abs dance moves being done, it was seriously a wonder that all three of them still hadn't developed six-packs like those the robots' pilots had. (This was most likely due to the deep-fried Twinkies they were eating.) Even Ward had to admit that for a three-foot round ball, that 084 had some serious dance moves.

"You should join us," Skye said. "You have to keep those washboard abs from getting too bloated, you know."

"My abs are fine, thank you." He couldn't believe he was having this conversation.

"Helps the core."

"I'm fine, thank you."

"C'mon, Ward!" she wheedled.

"I'll let you in on a little secret." Ward turned on his phone, and then called up a folder. He clicked on one picture of himself, with a hula-hoop around his waist. Skye's eyes nearly fell out of her head. "Before I got on the bus, I was part of a hula-hoop society and used them to get these abs." He waved at himself. "I was the master - the scorpion, the pizza toss, the oopsie-doodle." He raised his eyebrows at her, a small half-smile on his face.

"Wow," Skye gasped. "Wow. I mean, wow. That's..." she giggled. "That is so brilliant. Thank you for telling me this. This is the best." She then stopped, frowning, her eyes narrowing. "Why are you telling me this?"

"Because," he said as he leaned forward to whisper in his best HYDRA, dictator-of-the-world, Dr. Evil voice, "nobody will ever believe you." He smirked as he hit the "delete" button for the folder.

With a smirk, he walked away.

{ }

Fitz and Skye had figured out - well, Fitz figured it out as Skye cheered - that they could make the 084 like a furry version of Air Jordan (do kids even know who Michael Jordan is today? Ward groused) and hung up a little basketball hoop. Skye whipped out her Angry Birds plush toys, and they soon had the 084 trained to jump forward, catch the Angry Bird as they threw it, and slam-dunk it into the basket all in one jump. Skye even taught it how to do a flip on the way to the basket.

He discovered this new game the day he was walking down the stairs from Coulson's office. As he stepped down the stairs, the black Angry Bird hit him in the middle of the forehead. Irritated, he started to turn to the pair when the 084 hit him in the chest, mid-bounce. It fell to the floor with a thud, stunned, and then looked up at his irritated frown - and had a little accident.

"Marzipan!" Skye shouted.

Then the little 084 looked at the mess on the carpet and burst into tears.

"Icing!" Skye shouted.

And here was the other problem.

Simmons had become its _de facto_ mom. ("Mum" is a flower, he insisted to the insulted biochemist.) She made sure it ate properly, designing a diet based on what she knew about it. She made sure it was warm. (How could it be cold on the bus?!) She gave it a bath every day, using distilled water and natural soap, at exactly at 8:13 pm downstairs in the lab, and generally sang as she did so. (Not that he was ever present to watch, or anything. That would make him a creeper. And he's not a creeper. Not all the time, anyhow.) She now slept on a cot in the interrogation room, right near the 084.

When it was tired, it hopped into her arms. When it was happy, it hopped into her arms. When it was hungry, it hopped into her arms. When it cried, it hopped into her arms. Whenever she came into its line of sight, it hopped into her arms.

During the day, it would follow her around the lab, its flippers wrapped around the calf of her leg. Skye thought it looked adorable, peering up at everybody from Simmons's knee-height.

Ward had even seen the biochemist discipline the 084. Once it was playing with its apple slices, balancing them on its nose, much to the delight of Skye. Without even looking up from what she was doing, Simmons had simply said, sternly, "NO," and the 084 had immediately ceased, obediently eating the apple pieces it had played with earlier. Ward's appreciation and admiration for the biochemist had shot up twenty points that one moment. His platonic appreciation and admiration, of course. Platonic.

Now, the Angry Birds basketball game at an abrupt end, Simmons flew up the stairs and immediately scooped up the 084. It clung to her, getting hot pink icing tears and remnants of sticky marzipan all over her clothes. "What happened?" she demanded.

"Why don't you ask the NBA talent scouts over there?" Ward said, glaring at Fitz and Skye.

Coulson and May, by that time, and come out of their respective areas to observe. "Skye, Fitz, you clean up the mess on the carpet," Coulson replied mildly.

"Thank you, sir," Ward muttered. Of course the Level 8 would shut this all down right then.

"And if you're going to play basketball with him, do it in the cargo bay."

Ward looked at Coulson, betrayed.

{ }

It was late at night, and Ward was headed out of his bunk when he heard a small noise in the lounge. He was instantly put on alert, stalking silently through the plane until he reached his destination - then he stopped short.

Simmons was asleep in a high-backed chair, the little 084 snuggled contentedly in her arms. An unconscious smile spread over his face, and he quietly pulled a blanket from one of the nearby closets. He approached stealthily and quietly tucked the blanket around her sleeping form. When he looked down, he saw a pair of brown eyes blink at him.

D-mn.

The 084 looked up at him with placid, clear eyes, then looked down at the blanket, and he beamed.

Then it pointed its arm at the Paddington Bear, who was lying on his back on the seat next to them.

"Oh, h-ll no," Ward hissed in a low tone, then quickly shut up when he realized he might wake Simmons. And then clamped his jaw shut when he realized he was conversing with _it_. He glared.

The little 084's beam disappeared, and his whole expression changed, and his little nose trembled. Jemma was about to covered in tears - well, icing - if he didn't do something fast.

Ward groaned to himself, then went to the closet to get another blanket. He tucked it around the Paddington Bear. Good night, he was a Level 7 specialist. He should not be tucking #$%^ teddy bears into bed. "There," he mouthed at the 084. "Happy?"

The 084 beamed. Ward rolled his eyes.

The 084 leaned forward a little, putting his head under Ward's hand. Ward rolled his eyes, then patted the little 084's head and scratched behind his ears. The 084 beamed and then snuggled back into Jemma's arms.

Then it pointed at the Paddington Bear.

Ward shook his head. When the 084 gave him the sad puppy dog eyes again, the agent sighed and scratched a little of the teddy bear's head, behind the ears. It wasn't easy because that bear had that ridiculous red hat sewn to its head and then was, of course, lying on its back because it was _sleeping_.

Now he was talking about stuffed animals as if they were alive. He was never going to live this down.

* * *

They got a call from SHIELD to talk to an outside expert about the 084 and flew to Utah to meet the head of GeoComTex. May and Coulson went out first; Ward followed, escorting Simmons, who was carrying the 084. The bald man who was waiting for them made Ward tense up - he was like a used car salesman, with a glint in his eye that unsettled the team. The specialist did not have a good feeling about this.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Simmons wrap her arms a little more tightly around the 084.

After the obligatory greetings, which all went by too quickly for the specialist's comfort, the man approached Ward and Simmons. "Is this him?" The man smiled as he came over towards them. Seemed all rather feral to Ward.

The 084 hid its face in Simmons' arms.

"Oh, that's OK, kiddo," the man said in what was supposed to be a soothing tone as he petted the 084. To Ward, the whole thing sounded more like a shark about to attack. He didn't even like the 084 and he was reluctant to turn him over.

"Well, Mr. van Statten, we need you to sign the paperwork. We'll be back in forty-eight hours to check," Coulson began.

"Oh, you won't need to check on him. We'll take good care of ya, huh?"

Coulson started to hand over the papers when there was a shout from behind them. "No! Don't!" Skye flew down the ramp, her laptop open. "Don't give him to this sick bastard - he'll torture him to see what's inside our baby!"

As in on cue, to confirm whatever Skye was saying, van Statten's men immediately whipped out weapons. Van Statten ripped Skye's computer from her arms and shot it several times. Then he turned to Simmons. "Now come here, little girl," he said to the biochemist, who immediately got a mulish look on her face - whether from being told to turn over the 084 or from being called 'little girl' Ward didn't know. "Give the alien to me. Unless you want your friends - " he waved to the five of them, under direct fire from van Statten's henchmen " - to die."

Simmons glared, tightening her hold on the 084.

As if on cue, suddenly there was a loud, piercing noise and bright lights (bright even in the Utah sunshine) as Fitz's DWARVES swarmed forward. The temporary distraction was enough, as Coulson shot one of van Statten's men and May disarmed another.

Van Statten grabbed Simmons' arm, trying to pull it free from the 084, who was crying in fear now. The biochemist refused to let go, so he began to pull her along, too; one of his henchmen helped to grab her other arm, the two of them dragging her and the 084 away as he, May, and Coulson fought off the others.

"Skye! Get back to the bus!" Ward shouted. "Start up the plane!"

He dispatched of his attacker quickly, but when he turned back, Simmons, the 084, van Statten, and the henchman had disappeared. He looked around frantically, but May and Coulson were more than occupied with the overwhelming numbers they had. "Fitz, some help!" he shouted, pressing the communication device a little farther into his ear.

"They took some underground elevator," Fitz's voice blared in his ear. "I'm going to try to force it up."

There was a loud buzzing from two of the DWARVEs, and suddenly a loud grinding noise. Ward watched as part of the Utah soil begin to push up, and the glass elevator carrying the four slowly rose from the ground. Ward fired at the top of the glass, trying to shatter it without hitting Simmons or the 084; nothing doing. The henchman inside then leveled a machine gun at him, even as van Statten furiously punched at buttons, trying to get the elevator to descend.

The machine gun fire caused Ward to dive to the side, but it significantly weakened the Plexiglass of the elevator. Ward started running towards the elevator, firing at the glass to further weaken it. He braced for impact, ready to jump through when he saw a blur fly at the glass and then the glass shatter and fly out from the force of the blow. Simmons had her jacket pulled over her head with one hand, her other still hanging onto the 084; she was running full tilt from the elevator right towards him, glass still falling around her as she tried to protect the 084 from the falling pieces.

Ward quickly popped off a shot, hitting the gunman. Van Statten grabbed the fallen guard's gun and raised it, getting off a few rounds. Ward pushed Simmons and the 084 to the ground, covering them with his body, grunting in pain as a shot dug into his side. He radioed Fitz, who sent the DWARVEs in as a distraction. Ward rolled off of them, yelling into Simmons' ear, "Bus, now!" As she took off, the baby in her arms, he turned back to fire a couple shots, hitting van Statten in the shoulder even as the elevator lowered back into the ground.

"Let's get off this rock!" Coulson shouted as the four of them barrelled onto the bus, the DWARVEs flying ahead of them, back to their nest. Fitz was already closing the cargo bay door as they raced aboard. May immediately bolted for the cockpit as the plane began to move, Skye shouting, "Wheels are going up in three!"

{ }

"We'll be checking to see which source sent us there," Coulson promised as he watched Simmons finish taking a few glass pieces from the 084's fur and carefully apply ointment to cuts. "That guy shouldn't be in business."

"What does he do?"

"Seems like he was not unlike Ian Quinn, seeking to profit," Skye replied. "I only got what I saw from a few personal websites, after combing through all his official company websites."

"Even if we go back after him, how do we even find him again?" Simmons pointed out. "We didn't even see his compound."

"There was certainly something underground, but I couldn't tell the extent of the structure," Fitz acknowledged. "But I did have the DWARVEs drop a tracker into the elevator. It will send out a distress signal, and hopefully somebody can come deal with it."

"Send it up to my office," Coulson replied, already herding the engineer and the hacker out. "I want all this reported to SHIELD now."

Simmons finished caring for the 084 and gave it a big kiss before murmuring something about it being a brave, brave baby. The little thing hiccuped but smiled tearfully up at her, and she gave him two pieces of candied apple on a napkin. It started in happily on one of them, holding it with its two flippers.

She then turned to Ward and carefully peeled off the gauze she had put on to stop the bleeding; then gently touched his side. "Feel that?"

"Yeah."

"The first dose of anesthetic wasn't enough, then. Let me try an extra dose before I try to get that bullet out." She injected him again, then took the waiting time to shake glass out of her own hair and clothing.

After a couple minutes, it really felt numb, and he lay on his side as she began to work. Very quickly she had already moved on to stitching him up, her long, slim fingers gentle against his skin. When she finished with her customary gentle smile ("All done!"), he blurted jokingly, "What, no kiss or candied apple?"

He swore it was the anesthetic. Surely the anesthetic. Never mind that it was shot locally and shouldn't have affected his brain.

She just stared at him, shocked, before Coulson rang for her. She gave him one more befuddled look before heading upstairs.

He turned to the 084, who held out to him the other piece of candied apple and beamed.

* * *

It turned out that there was a piece of alien debris found in the ocean nearest where the 084 had been found - a big, metallic piece of metal that looked like part of a ship of some sort.

"Of course we should examine it!" Ward exclaimed. "Why haven't we seen it yet?"

"Well," Coulson sighed, "there's the small matter of picking it up."

"We have a bus. We'll fly over, Fitz'll use one of his gadgets to hook it up, we'll fish it out, and that'll be the end of it."

"Actually, another agency has it."

Ward blinked. "Oh. Well, we have good relationships with most agencies."

Coulson and May exchanged looks.

"Who's got it? UNIT? UNCLE? THRUSH? VILE? UGLI? SWORD? STRIKE? STARS? SPIDER? THUNDER? SMASH? SPECTRE? SHADOW? SABRE? RED? MASK? KAOS? KABOOM? HIVE? HEAT? HAMMER? GRAMPA? FOWL? FLAG? BLU? ANVIL?"

Coulson sighed. "Really, Ward?"

"C'mon, admit it. Hill scoffs, but let's just all say it together now: we're only the Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement, and Logistics Division so we can spell out SHIELD."

Coulson looked offended.

"My life's dream was to be an Agent of WOOHP, but they didn't take my application." Ward shrugged. "So which alphabet agency took our stuff? ACP? CEAO? OAU? CIA?"

Coulson sighed. "NCIS. Won't give it up."

"NCIS? The American navy one?" Ward was baffled when Coulson nodded. How was this even an issue? They were a pea-sized agency of a single nation. They didn't even have their own _plane_. How could NCIS possibly beat alien-hunting agency like SHIELD in _any_ head-to-head match-up? "Why don't we just go and take it?"

"Jethro Gibbs is a scary man?" Coulson ventured, more like a question than a statement.

"Well, tell him this is our jurisdiction!" Ward exclaimed. When Coulson hedged, he shook his head in barely concealed shock and turned to May. The Cavalry simply gave a 'don't involve me' smile and held up her hands in a 'hands-off' gesture. He stared at them incredulously. "Well, I'm not afraid of him," Ward huffed as he left.

Coulson turned to an amused May. "Watch this."

{ }

"I thought you said you were calling NCIS," Skye said, frowning as they gathered around the briefing table on the main floor of the bus.

Ward just narrowed his eyes at her as they waited for the SHIELD phone to dial up. "I just found another way to get the information we needed."

"You didn't call NCIS, did you," Fitz retorted.

"What does it matter whom I called?" Ward grumbled defensively. "I've got a resource who can tell us where the 084 is from."

"You didn't call NCIS!" Skye exclaimed, pouting. "Thanks a lot!" she grumbled as she fished out a twenty dollar bill and handed it to Fitz.

Ward made a small noise demonstrating the great amount offense he took to Skye's actions.

"You did call NCIS?" Skye said hopefully. At his facial expression, she cheered. "Yay!" she held out her hand to Fitz, who returned the twenty with a grumble. "So where's this chunk of ship?"

"We don't need that chunk of ship," Ward grumbled. "Let 'em keep it."

"D-mn!" Skye handed the twenty back to Fitz, who gloated.

Coulson shrugged knowingly at May.

The screen flickered, and suddenly Coulson's smug smile fell off his face. He stared at Ward. "Where'd you find him?!" he exclaimed, looking at Ward, betrayed.

"Simmons gave me the number to Jane Foster," Ward said smugly.

"Jane Foster knows what this thing is?" May asked.

"Wait, Jane Foster knows Simmons?" Skye exclaimed, looking betrayed. She glared at Jemma. "You know I love Thor! We could've met him lots earlier than now!"

"Focus!" May said sharply, then turned back to Ward. "Jane Foster knows that the 084 is?"

"No, but her boyfriend does."

There was a beat, then: "He doesn't know I'm alive!" Coulson whispered furiously.

"Well, now he does," Ward replied with a smirk.

"We're going to have a long talk about where your loyalties lie," Coulson grumbled.

"Me! My loyalties are fine! It's not like I'm HYDRA! Besides, which traitor let me actually video conference with Jethro Gibbs?!" Ward whispered furiously.

"You WANTED to!" Coulson whispered back.

"A WARNING would have been nice," Ward retorted, still in a low voice. "That glare and headslap of his? How is Gibbs not on SHIELD's index?!"

Coulson pursed his lips, looking back at Ward for a beat. "OK," he conceded, holding his hand out in a conciliatory handshake. "Even?"

"Even," Ward said, shaking it.

"Son of Coul!" a voice boomed, but evidently the camera was still blank on their side. "I don't see him. Are you sure he is alive? Because I wish to have words with him about his little...subterfuge."

Then the blond god appeared on camera, and May and Skye both sighed as if on reflex, starry-eyed. FitzSimmons and Ward looked over at Coulson, who just shook his head, resigned.

Thor leaned into the camera. "Ah, it is you! And looking so well, Son of Coul."

"Um, thank you, sir."

"I am disappointed that you had not told me earlier. After all, I had to bear the pain of watching my brother kill you."

"Yes, well, things came up." Coulson looked distinctly uncomfortable.

"Things more important than, say, announcing the fact that you had not died?"

"Touché," Fitz commented under his breath. Coulson glared at him.

"I also have discovered that you have been alive for many months - or so the Lady Sif tells me. And that _you_ asked her not to inform me."

"Level 7 clearance," Coulson apologized.

"They are not Level 7," Thor replied, pointing at the three younger agents, and Coulson looked at Ward, betrayed. The specialist just shrugged, completely unrepentant about his traitorous behavior. "It is not polite to allow your friends to believe you dead," Thor scolded.

"Yes," Coulson conceded. "I should have mentioned it before. I apologize." He paused, evidently then decided that a good offense was the best defense. "So how come when I call you to ask a question about Asgardian stuff, you're off the grid, but Ward calls about a fuzzy 084, and you're available to chat?"

"So how come when I call SHIELD to ask about you, you're dead?"

"Buuuurrrn," Skye whistled.

* * *

Ward supposed the ending was rather anticlimatic. All it took was that short ten-minute phone call to Thor to identify the 084; Asgard had quite a lot of experience with this species. They were also going to ensure safe passage; Sif would come in the next eighteen hours to take the little 084 home.

The tone on the bus was subdued - everybody was quiet, especially Simmons. She packed some things for it to eat, and Skye and Fitz arranged for a small media player whose battery could operate manually and put recordings of Jemma's singing on it. They included two laminated photos - one of Simmons, one of the team. The last item to go into the bag was Paddington Bear, who was now going much, much farther than either Peru or the Windsor Gardens.

The 084 was ignorant of the decisions made for it and thus seemed puzzled by the relative quiet that had settled over the three younger agents. It blew raspberries repeatedly to try to make Skye smile and puffed out its chest like the Australian jaeger to get Fitz's attention. At dinner the morning before Sif was to arrive, he looked up at Simmons, baffled, and used his small flippers to push at the corners of her mouth to make her smile.

It wasn't until they arrived at the Bifrost and he was being carried to it alone that he realized his caretaker was not coming with him. He clung to the biochemist for a good half-hour, sobbing, as the others looked on with sad discomfort and Simmons tried to console him. The little 084 then cried hot pink-icing tears all the way up the Bifrost to Asgard.

The minute they were out of sight, Simmons brushed herself off and marched back to her lab. Fitz and Skye followed her directions to clean up some things, but then left when it appeared she wasn't in the mood to talk. Fitz squeezed her shoulder before following Skye upstairs.

Ward didn't get the hint. He watched her move about the lab, and then finally said, "It's normal to be sad."

"Why would I be sad? He's returning to his parents. It's not as though we had the capability or the time to care for him on a regular basis." Her voice was crisp, short, dismissive.

"You _were_ his mother for two weeks," he replied.

She only looked at him, her expression one of contempt for the sentiment he had just put forth - but she had never been good at dissembling.

When he walked over and wrapped his arms around her, she shuddered against him and he could feel her hot tears soak his shirt. He kissed her softly on the forehead.

* * *

Agent Ward walked between the masses of people gathered in the underground portion of the temporary shelter: some elderly, some middle-aged, some younger adults, some teenagers, some children. Most families were reunited, with varying degrees of success. Some of the able-bodied had already volunteered to help SHIELD in civilian capacities, doing technology and science and accounting and paperwork to free up the agents.

The attacks had started a year ago, giant dinosaur-lizard-like invaders that had wreaked havoc wherever they had landed. Underground bunkers had become the main source of safety for those who were left. SHIELD's warnings in the months leading up had been laughed off by major governments and by the regular people, who had considered the organization "paranoid". Now the circumstances were dire enough that the newest group of Avengers had even called on Asgard, who brought with them otherworldly warriors. It was surreal in ways Ward's grandparents would never have suspected.

The agent neared a corner where there was a small, temporary fence around a carpeted area. There were some children playing there, and some so tuckered out that they were asleep. A little girl sat in the corner, crying and hiccuping quietly.

"Been crying since she got here," said the elderly lady who had volunteered to help watch the children. "Doesn't respond much. When I hold her, she just sits and continues to cry."

Ward looked over at the little girl, then stepped over and picked up the child unceremoniously. The little girl just looked at the unfamiliar face and kept crying but didn't protest. "I'll bring her back," the agent intoned on the way out.

The little girl continued crying, uninterested in everything around her as Ward continued to make the rounds. Soon the pair headed upstairs, the little girl hiccuping slightly and still crying steadily.

As they headed up in the elevator, the agent started singing softly, a tune Grandma Ward used to sing regularly. She had a lovely voice - or at least her grandchildren thought so. It was clear, simple, sweet, strong - typifying who she was. It wasn't until adulthood that Agent Ward realized Grandma's lullabies were great classics of Western music - that's just how nerdy she was.

The agent's singing (having just moved from _Cosi Fan Tutte_ to the aria from _The Consul_) seemed to calm the child, whose tears stopped; there were only occasional hiccups. She held to the lapels of the black suit tightly, slightly more interested in where they going. The agent continued signing softly as they moved through the hallways.

The Level 7 agent slid open the door to the war room and stepped inside, then quietly closed the door behind them. The singing continued softly even as the pair circled the perimeter. In the center, top-level SHIELD agents, three Asgardian warriors, and five of the Tuturri were discussing battle strategy, with the Asgardians serving as translators.

It was odd, having Tuturri as fellow warriors. They looked like gigantic fluffy penguins, except they were pastel-colored, in yellow and pink and blue and purple and green, with different mixes of colors in the fur. Apparently the fur color indicated what part of the planet they originated. They also had cute bear-like faces and triangular ears like a Corgi's and chittered quietly as their main language.

Scarily, they also wore huge bandoliers, like Chewbacca, and their teeth grew to sharp points; the skin under the fur was especially tough. They were quite dangerous and intelligent, and the Asgardians swore by them as upright but fierce warriors. The first time Ward had seen one in battle was both a shocking and brilliant experience: the Tuturri, screaming in furious determination as they jumped forward powerfully, launching like a rocket, flippers forward, holding a weapon pointed at the target. The agent had seen one of the warriors choke one of the lizards to death - literally - with its flippers and one of its weapons; SHIELD scientists had calculated the force of a Tuturrian body slam to be equivalent to the force of three tractor trailers, hitting simultaneously, each going at 80 miles per hour. Who would've thought the gigantic stuffed animal was so dangerous? Ward bet even Grandpa, who was paranoid about everything, wouldn't have anticipated such a dangerous form of life bundled in a cute exterior.

One of Tuturri frowned, and then Agent Ward was suddenly face to face with a gigantic Tuturri (Tuturrus?), who at 9 feet tall dwarfed the much smaller human. It said something directly to the human agent. A puzzled Asgardian turned to it, then to Ward. "He asks where you learned that melody you sing."

"Well, it's a classic of Western music," Ward replied, frowning. "But my grandmother used to sing it when she sang lullabies. Among other things."

The Asgardian translated, and the Tuturri seemed surprised, chittering away at the Asgardian. "He asks your name."

"Elizabeth Ward."

The Tuturri seemed to recognize part of that, then chittered away some more, excited.

"And your grandmother?"

"Dr. Jemma Simmons Ward. She was with SHIELD."

The Tuturri reached inside what seemed like a pocket in his front - not unlike a kangaroo - and pulled out a carefully protected but worn leather folder and held it out to the agent.

Ward frowned, taking the folder; she flipped it open, took one look, and gasped.

The Tuturri then gently lifted the child from Ward's arms. The little girl didn't cry but looked up at the big, furry, incompatibly fierce warrior. He gently held her in one flipper and patted her head with the other, then gently cuddled the distraught child to its chest. The little girl burrowed into its pastel blue and purple fur, sniffling but now smiling, comforted.

The Tuturri pointed at the photos with his free arm. He chittered. "He asks if that's your grandmother," the Asgardian translated.

"It is," Ward said in a puzzled tone, looking at the large headshot of her grandmother. "But she's quite young - younger than I am now. That's my grandfather," she said, pointing straight at the dark-haired specialist in the next photo, holding it up to the big warrior to show him who she meant. "Grant Ward."

That name needed no translation, nor did the Tuturri's surprise. He held his worn photos and pointed at Ward's grandfather and chittered in what was clearly a shocked tone. "Yes, they got married," Elizabeth replied, and was just as bewildered when the Tuturri began to laugh. It sounded like it was hiccuping, but was clearly laughing uncontrollably. That made the little girl giggle, which just made the big Tuturri warrior rumble even more in laughter.

At that moment, the other Tuturri chittered at their compatriot.

The big warrior handed the little girl, now smiling, back to the agent. He then bowed deeply to her, chittering in a serious tone as he maintained his bowing position.

"He honors Midgard and SHIELD for their care of him when he first came," the Asgardian translated. "He honors your grandparents - especially your grandmother. Today he repays to you the debt he owes them."

Ward watched, gaping, as the Tuturri warrior straightened, then followed his fellow warriors out. She was still staring at the closed door, open-mouthed, when the room emptied.

The little girl pointed out at the doorway where the warriors had gone. "Nice fuzzy!"

**END**


End file.
